For Your Eyes Only

"PRIVATE ISLAND" ALONG WITH "HOT FUDGE" and “not guilty,” is one of the most magical two-word phrases in the English language. It is that belief that brought my wife and me to the private island of Lana’i, just a short passenger ferry ride from Lahaina in Maui.

Stepping off the dock, I expect Ricardo Montalbán to emerge, in spotless white suit, Lilliputian sidekick in tow. I’m content with a lei (the more masculine kind made from seeds, not blooms) and a lift to our first digs, the Four Seasons Manele Bay, one of two resorts on Lana’i. On the short drive there, I’m struck by the stark, almost desert landscape of the place. For some reason I always think of Pacific islands as synonymous with jungle vegetation, but here there are tall pines and rolling, browned-grass hills. We pass by one of the island’s former pineapple fields, now fallow and overrun with long grass. Entrepreneur David H. Murdock purchased this island from the Dole Corporation in 1985, with the goal of turning Lana’i from the world’s largest pineapple plantation into one of the world’s most exclusive resorts. (Four Seasons has since branded both the hotels he built.)

Manele Bay has some of that James Bond villain je ne sais quoi. Huge, priceless-looking urns and ceramic dragons give the public areas an upscale chinoiserie vibe, but with a sparsely populated swath of private beach who wants to hang around inside? A quick change and we are camped out on loungers on white sand, while an attendant fixes our umbrellas and gives us pineapple chunks on skewers and chilled bottles of water. The mere mention of snorkelling, and immediately the complement of gear is at the ready, which we don to go explore the schools of fish lucky enough to frequent a private island. The beach—like all in Hawaii—is technically public. Here, that means a few day-trippers from Maui and the local populace of a few thousand, so it’s the most private public beach you’ll ever find.

The next day we venture out on the Jack Nicklaus-designed Challenge at Manele Bay course. True luxury, as anyone who’s ever shelled out $500 for a six-hour round at Pebble Beach can attest, is not the ability to play a great course in a perfect setting. It’s the ability to do that on your own without waiting on a single shot and not having to tee off with the peanut gallery looking on. We laze about the course as if we own it, playing a few of the spectacular par-three holes a couple of times, trying to prove that those first few bogeys resulted from unfamiliarity with the course. (They didn’t.)

We have another near-private round the following day, when we head up-island to take on the Experience at Koele, a Greg Norman design that, if anything, is more picturesque than its seaside sibling. Adjacent to the course sits the Four Seasons Lodge at Koele. Its modest size (just 102 rooms) and misty setting evoke a British hill station vibe. I half expect to find a Somerset Maugham character in the reading room, enjoying a sherry. The only knock on Lana’i is that there is almost nothing to do here but chill out. The quaint town takes all of 20 minutes to explore. So when the opportunity to go off-roading presents itself, we jump at it.
Though the island is less than 400 square kilometers, there are few paved roads. We’re handed the keys to a white Jeep caked in fine red dust and given broad directions to Shipwreck Beach. Thirty minutes of bumps and ruts later, we arrive at a sparse and windswept beach which would have an undisturbed view of neighbouring island Molokai were it not for the massive shipwreck smashed up on the sand.

“That thing looks really haunted,” says my wife of the rusting carcass. To me it looks like a cruise ship that was justifiably torpedoed as it tried to crash Lana’i’s private party.

On our hike back to the Jeep, we come across several surf shacks, made of plywood and corrugated steel and held together with discarded fishing nets. It’s the type of unsightly intrusion that has been long banished from polished Maui, but here strikes just the right chord of authenticity.
Back at the Lodge we dust the dirt off our legs before coming inside, like flip-flop-wearing cowboys. Some hands of cards are being played in the lobby, a few backgammon games are going on, cocktails are being consumed, and as we make our way back to the room we denizens all nod at each other, as if we were at a private club. Which, in a way, I suppose, we are. wl